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MEA is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization whose primary mission is to work with veterans and their families to publish short stories, essays, poems, and artwork in our bi-annual publication, As You Were: The Military Review, periodic editions of Blue Nostalgia: The Journal of Post-Traumatic Growth and others. Each author or poet that submits work to us is afforded the chance to work one-on-one with a mentor to polish their work or learn new skills and techniques.

Our staff is based all over the country and includes college professors, professional authors, veterans’ advocates, and clinicians. As such, most of our services are provided through email and online writing workshops.

All editing, consultations, and workshops are free of charge. Veterans and their families pay nothing for our services, and they never will.

Under our Publications tab, there are more than a dozen volumes of creative work crafted by veterans and their family members as well as a virtual art gallery. Our blog posts feature short pieces that cover a wide range of opinion editorials, literary reviews, and profiles on veteran artists and writers.

Please consider spending some time navigating our site and reading and seeing the fine work of veterans and their families from around the globe.

As You Were

Military Experience & the Arts invites submissions in the genres of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and artwork for publication in the upcoming publication As You Were: The Military Review.

As You Were, three words spoken quickly by non-commissioned and commissioned officers who choose to drop rank and get to business, is meant to put troops “at ease.” Military Experience & the Arts, in its singular, collaborative approach to publishing, has long sought to provide an atmosphere in which veterans and their loved ones can feel “at ease” when expressing themselves.

Our title also connotes a hearkening back, an exploration of the self and the past. We’re interested in those words and works of art that are brave enough to cut through rank and time, presenting military experience honestly, free of the white-washing that is so common in today’s war literature and art. We’ve published six volumes since 2011, providing each contributor–regardless of whether that contributor has published 25 words or 25 books–with some form of one-on-one consultation.

Here’s our review process: When you submit prose for consideration, you will first be assigned a “reader” who will read your work, critique it, and provide you with guidance meant to help you meet the standards of your genre’s managing editor. When you submit poetry, it will be blind-reviewed by the dozens of authors, educators, and veterans in our reader group. Artwork will be evaluated by our professional art historian and, if chosen for publication, included in an edited collection.